


choke/hold

by astoryaboutwar, ravyn_ashling



Series: shoot to thrill [2]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angst with a Happy Ending, Explicit Language, M/M, YOI Shit Bang 2017, Yuri has a potty mouth, yuri is a smol angry bean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2017-08-31
Packaged: 2018-12-21 10:21:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11942103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astoryaboutwar/pseuds/astoryaboutwar, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravyn_ashling/pseuds/ravyn_ashling
Summary: Otabek looks at him like his eyes don’t matter, raises a single fucking eyebrow like he’s saying -Yeah, I’ve got monsters too, let’s pull them out andplay-Like Yuri’s the one with the problem here, two sizes too small for the trappings of his skin.Yuri smokes too much, drinks hard from bottles in colours he can’t keep track of, rides every edge he can find because it’s easier to chase a high than to stop and think, for one second, thatif the eyes are the window to the soul, then what is it in him that died and is rotting?(Or: the powered assassins AU in which Yuri has emotional attachment Issues™, Otabek is long-suffering, and they skirt around a four-letter word that begins withL.)Set in the same 'verse asour doubts are traitors, but functions well as a standalone.





	choke/hold

**Author's Note:**

> Here we go - my offering to the YOI Shit Bang 2017, post-shitlist fiasco, because I am full of salt like that. :P The wonderfully talented ravyn_ashling was my Bang artist and (obviously) did the art for this, and it is all GORGEOUS and _please_ go give her some love.
> 
> This is set in the same 'verse as _[our doubts are traitors](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9409733)_ , though it functions well as a standalone. Chronologically, this fic - for the most part - takes place prior to the present-day events of _our doubts_.
> 
> For the sake of brevity and so everyone starts off on the same page - Yuri's gift ('power', pretty much) in this 'verse is essentially... _bad eyes_. Think DC's Scarecrow, except with the requirement of eye contact. Otabek's is the ability to nullify the gifts of others, and to be immune to the effects of gifts himself.
> 
> Enjoy!

  


 

_____

It’s early January in New York City, cold as all hell. Snow banks scoring walls along the roads, blackish slush smudging indoors. It’s a grey sky on every front, the air hostile and biting.

Yuri lights up a Dunhill, shields himself from the cold in a dingy back alley somewhere off 78th and Lexington. It’s a bad habit he should kick, but fuck it. Come back to him when you’ve murdered more people you can remember, and then maybe he’ll listen to your _health advisory_.

The cigarette’s mostly a bud by the time the tell-tale roar of a motorcycle draws up to the entrance of the alley, low and loud. A Harley, of- _fucking_ -course.

He flicks the bud to the ground, kills the light with the grind of the heel of his Guccis.

Footsteps, measured and solid. Combat boots, Yuri thinks. There’s the ringing jingle of some metallic buckle.

“You’re late,” Yuri sneers, bending to retrieve his duffel.

Otabek pulls off his helmet, threads a hand through his undercut. He makes a show of checking his watch, shaking his head.

“Ten forty-five,” he replies. “I’m right on time.” He jerks his head, leaning over to grab the spare helmet from storage. Tosses it over. “Put that on.”

Yuri eyes the helmet in his hand, a leopard print he’d cut his own tongue off before admitting he might’ve picked out for himself. He brings it up to sniff at it, wrinkling his nose in disdain as he tugs it on, working the straps and buckles. There’s that new-purchase smell.

“Come on, bad eyes,” Otabek calls. “Let’s go.”

Yuri bares his teeth, all sharp edges and brittle bones. “Don’t you _fucking_ dare call me that again.” He swings a leg over, settles in behind Otabek. Fits his hips to Otabek’s, feels the man shift once. “I’ll cut your cock off and feed it to the crows, you hear me?”

Otabek tilts his head, turning to lend Yuri his profile. “Am I wrong, though?” He shrugs, Yuri’s threat sluicing like water off his back. A throaty chuckle, and he pulls his helmet back on. “We both know you love my cock too much, _Yura._ ”

The roar of the Harley’s engine drowns out any answer Yuri might have had.

 

 

_____

 

 

 

It’s all over the news by the time they get to the designated safehouse, a derelict warehouse shoved in off the East River.

 _A murder in Lenox Hill Hospital_ , the tinny voice of the newscaster says, over the crappy box TV with an honest-to-god aerial. _Police are combing the area for suspects_.

Yuri snorts. Fucking amateurs.

He roots through the pocket of his slacks for his Dunhills, tossing the carton aside when he realises it’s empty. It falls to the grimy floor metres away, joining broken bottles of Corona and scattered used condoms. Yuri curls his lip in disgust.

“Since when do you smoke?”

Yuri scoffs. “The hell do you care?”

Otabek’s reclining on the single lawn chair that’s somehow made its way into this shithole of a building, teetering precariously on spindly legs. He rolls a shoulder, face impassive. “Must’ve been recent. You didn’t use to.”

“So?”

Otabek glances at the discarded pack of cigarettes, lifting a single eyebrow. “Victor smokes Dunhills.”

“ _Victor_ ,” Yuri spits, “Can fuck off and die.”

That single eyebrow rises higher, disappears into a black hairline. “He’s on that Katsuki job, last I heard.”

“That what he still claims?” Yuri says, derision clear in his tone. “He’s a selfish piece of shit, is what he is.”

Otabek sends him a unimpressed look. Yuri _glares_ , gathers the demons in his mind and presses them forward. _Bad eyes._ Shit, fuck them. He’s made grown men _piss_ from a glance alone.

Otabek rolls his eyes, entirely unaffected. “You _know_ that doesn’t work on me.”

He strips off his leather jacket with efficient movements, reclines on the chair in his henley and jeans and his combat boots.

It’s attractive as sin and it makes Yuri _furious_ that want prickles at his skin, curls low in his belly.

“I’m not _riding_ you on that lawn chair,” he hisses, stalking away. He yanks his _balisong_ from his pocket, twirling the butterfly knife in practiced hands. _A tic,_ Lilia’d pointed out. _You do that when you’re nervous._

It infuriates him that he can’t stop.

Bemused, Otabek hums. “I wasn’t going to ask you to, but it’s nice you were thinking of me.”

Yuri lifts a hand in response, middle finger raised.

Otabek’s quiet laughter echoes throughout the warehouse.

Yuri sets his teeth. “When we get to Moscow, though.” Metal sings through the air, slashes in quick gaps between his fingers. “ _Maybe.”_

“Yeah?” Otabek says, and there’s a pitch to his voice, dark and husky with ripening promise. Yuri doesn’t look. God damn it. “Whatever you want, _Yura.”_

 

_____

 

 

 

Otabek looks him in the eyes.

Always.

Not fleeting, not the _fuck I looked at him by accident, what’s going to happen to me now_ dart-and-glance, not the sneering look of cocksure contractors who think he’s a glorified twink with a party trick stare.

It’s steady.

Unyielding.

Yuri hisses and spits, probably hates it. Shit. He doesn’t know, what does he _know?_ He’s the boy whose parents died to get away from him, whom no one else wanted until Yakov fished him out of foster care and Lilia broke him down and remade him.

_We’re not a charity, boy, you’re working for us._

Otabek looks at him like his eyes don’t matter, raises a _single fucking eyebrow_ like he’s saying -

Yeah, I’ve got monsters too, let’s pull them out and _play_ -

Like Yuri’s the one with the problem here, two sizes too small for the trappings of his skin.

Otabek looks at him like he has a whistle and a prayer, like he’s got a wish and it isn’t death, and Yuri -

Yuri smokes too much, drinks hard from bottles in colours he can’t keep track of, rides every edge he can find because it’s easier to chase a high than to stop and think, for one second, that _if the eyes are the window to the soul_ , then what is it in him that died and is rotting?

Dream on, demon child. Dream on.

Life is nothing but the hollowing of borrowed bones, and no one will want his when he’s done with it.

 

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Puma meows.

Loud, insistent, and the chime of his bell as he paws for attention is - _distracting_ -

Otabek’s got him bent over the sofa, head pillowed on his hands on the cushions, and his cock is splitting him open, _fuck,_ dragging slick and filthy and _perfect,_ and Otabek’s grunting with the effort of his thrusts, and -

Puma meows.

“Go. _Away,”_ Yuri hisses between the gaps in his teeth. Otabek chuckles behind him, low and breathless, and _shit,_ that’s a good angle -

Puma jumps up onto the sofa, head butting Yuri in the face.

Yuri swears. Flings a hand back to shove Otabek back and away, and _fuck,_ okay, the loss of him is empty, alright, god _damn_ it -

Plucks Puma off the sofa and deposits him in his bedroom, shutting the door behind him.

Yuri shucks his half-unbuttoned shirt as he goes, cock bobbing hard and leaking every step he takes back to Otabek.

Otabek raises a single eyebrow; _can we carry on now?_

Yuri sneers in unspoken reply, pushes him down onto the sofa and swings a leg over to straddle him. Reaches behind him to grip Otabek in hand, smirks at the audible hiss of pleasure in response as he _squeezes_ his cock in his fist and guides it into him and sinks _down._

“As you were,” Yuri says, just to be a shit because he _can_ , and Otabek works a finger behind him in answer, presses _hard_ on the sensitive flesh where they’re joined, the edge of a blunt nail catching on Yuri’s rim.

Yuri’s breath hitches, and Otabek grins, teeth flashing white in the low light of his flat. Yuri scowls, tightens his ass, lifts off and works back down _excruciatingly_ slow until they’re both panting with it, but he claims that victory.

“You’re a bastard, you know that?” Otabek murmurs, leaning up to nip at his lower lip, jostling for leverage to fit their mouths together -

Yuri shoves him back, rolls his hips to get the right angle, gets a hand around himself to stroke at his cock.

“Yeah, fuck off,” he says, and there’s Otabek’s hand knocking his own away to take over working his cock, Yuri bouncing up and down, thighs flexing on every pass, “Tell me something _new.”_

Otabek watches him. Dark, comprehending, lust-blown and no less lethal for it. His eyes are -

 _On_ Yuri, _in_ Yuri, it makes him furious and terrified in equal measure, _fuck him,_ who does he _think_ he is, Yuri’s got a one-way ticket to hell and shit-all fucks to give, who’s Otabek to _look at him_ like he’s -

Like he’s maybe worth more than monsters and bones?

He can see the edge of Otabek’s sprawling tattoo over the curve of his shoulder, the eagle spread over his back.

Yuri leans in, lips wet with spit -

Bites _hard_ on the join of neck and shoulder, marks his teeth over the tip of a wing, and Otabek _grunts_ , hips stuttering, and his fist around Yuri’s cock tightens, steals the breath from Yuri’s lungs, fingers digging bruises into the jut of his hips -

Yuri comes with the taste of Otabek’s blood in his mouth, iron-sweet and sharp.

Otabek’s panting, hips thrusting in little increments, and there’s a telltale slickness down his thighs.

And then it’s over, the war fought and won except this time it’s both sides left breathing.

Yuri pushes off Otabek, feels his cock slip free from inside him, deliberately tightens to watch the wince play across Otabek’s face at the overstimulation. He smiles, teeth honed, and Otabek smacks his ass in response.

There’s come trickling down the inside of his thighs, smearing his cheeks wet and sticky.

“Damn it,” Yuri complains, “Use a fucking condom, you made a mess.”

Otabek glances over from where he’s tugging his boxers on, wadded-up tissues in hand. “Did I need to?”

It’s -

Fuck him, they don’t talk about this.

He glares, wishes for the life of him that his gift worked on Otabek.

Yeah. No.

Yuri sneers, bites his words mean just because he can. “What do you _think?_ ”

It’s a knowing look he receives in return, that sets his teeth on edge and makes him buck at the bit.

“I don’t know,” Otabek says, doing up the buttons of his shirt. “Why don’t you tell me?”

It’s not a good defence if it isn’t at least a slight offence, Yuri knows. He swipes tissues from the box on the nightstand, wipes at his come-streaked thighs, down behind his balls and over his cock. Otabek’s eyes track his movements, and Yuri can’t help that vicious surge of triumph.

“I sucked some guy’s cock on an op.”

It’s a lie, but Otabek doesn’t know that.

Yuri’s always rolled mean with the punches, punched back hard and played fucking dirty. There’s always the taste of iron at the back of his mouth, demons fighting their way out of his mind, and he’s got blood flaking under his nails and bruises on his knuckles, but he’s not the one going down, not ever.

He’s going to live forever, riding that sharp edge blown past purgatory and back, you mark his words.

Otabek pauses in shrugging on his jacket, resumes with stiffness. “Yeah?”

“Mmm,” Yuri continues, drives the knife deeper because he’s never been able to resist the urge to _hurt_. “It wasn’t bad.”

“It _wasn’t bad_ ,” Otabek echoes.

“No- _pe.”_ He rounds his lips around the _p,_ pops the consonant with deliberate, perverse delight.

Yuri stands from the bed, fighting the burn of his thighs to toss used tissues into the bin. He spots the leg of his slacks, the rest of the garment hidden under the bed, and he bends to retrieve it.

There’s movement behind him, the darting sound of someone moving at speed, and Yuri’s sex-stupid and body-languid and his balisong’s in the pocket of his slacks, his gun in a shucked holster, _fuck_ -

Otabek’s on him, pinning him face-first against the floor, both of his arms trapped behind his back, pulled taut, ass in the air.

A finger traces his hole, bared to the room. He shivers, involuntary.

“ _Wasn’t bad,_ ” Otabek repeats, and shoves two fingers into him.

Yuri can’t stifle the cry of surprise, tightening around the digits in reflex, shifting against the sensitive rim of his used ass.

“What the _fuck_ , _Beka,”_ he seethes, “Get _off_.”

Otabek curls his fingers inside him in response, nailing his recovering prostate _hard._

“ _Shit,”_ Yuri curses, “I can’t, we’ve gone three rounds. _Fuck. Off._ ”

“Did he get you off after? Make you feel as good as _this?”_ He’s thrusting his fingers roughly, and there’s residual lube and come slicking the way from a night of getting his ass pounded, but there’s still the dull catch of a burn with the stretch and retreat.

Yuri grits his teeth, feels the way he’s shifting back on Otabek’s fingers. “Don’t tell me you’re _jealous.”_

Yuri tosses his head with an arch of his neck, cocks back to look at Otabek, crouched over behind him. He knows the pretty picture he presents, ass in the air, cheeks spread, thighs shiny with semen and slick, the delicate curve of his profile, the gold of his hair.

Otabek’s jaw clenches.

Yuri savours that surge of triumph, hot and fast and potent. He’s levered up on his knees now, rocking in time to fingers in his ass. A particularly strong brush over his prostate has him hissing in pleasure, eyes half-shut in smug satisfaction.

He chuckles, throaty and raw and _mean,_ and bow, exit stage right, that’s the signature Yuri Plisetsky, the boy who’s got the devil’s look, blacker than sin and more sinful than hell. Don’t look too hard, don’t stand too close. The devil takes his own, don’t you know?

“ _Beka,”_ he says, “Are you going to fuck me properly, or should I find someone else to do it for me?”

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Yuri’s parents died when he was four.

Save the fucking pity. He doesn’t remember much of them beyond the smell of booze and a tiny, one bedroom shithole with cracks in the wall and paint flaking off the ceiling.

He remembers his uncle, though, after. How he tried to hold him down, called him a _pretty boy, aren’t you, bet you’d look so pretty with your mouth around my -_

It’s a look.

That’s all it ever takes.

One.

Look.

He remembers his uncle screaming, backing into a wall, clawing at his temple with desperate hands. _God, no, leave me alone, please, somebody, I’m begging - make it stop, oh my god, they’re everywhere -_

He’s four, and he remembers standing in the room where his uncle tried to rape him, the bodies of his parents still warm in their graves.

His mother used to flinch when she looked at him.

His uncle succumbs to the terror, digs out his own eyes with his fingers, screaming as he does.

Yuri watches. He always does, that all he does.

Bad eyes. Bad _fucking_ eyes.

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Four in the A.M. and Yuri’s phone lights up with messages, buzzing a racket in the pocket of his jeans. _True Religion_ , tailored to frame his ass perfectly. He flicks a dead cigarette bud from his fingers, watches it fall twenty floors to ash concrete below.

It’s just photos, first of some cookie-cutter Euroshit club with dark walls and strobe lights, then a ten-second video of Otabek making out with some faceless groupie wedged into his DJ booth. His hand’s extended, he’s holding the phone up. Otabek breaks the kiss, and the low light glints off the string of saliva that trails from his lip to the slut who’d made out with him. He smirks into the camera, and the recording ends.

It’s not anger, Yuri thinks. Anger doesn’t feel like this, scorching through his veins from low in his gut to rise to his throat and catch. It’s incandescent and _raging_ and this - this is _fury_ , red-hot coals pushed into his blood, razing.

A muffled groan from the room behind him, and Yuri bottles that rage. Savours it, lets it turn his mouth into a snarl. He shoves his phone back into his pocket as he turns. More groans, now a stifled yell of alarm.

Maybe he should thank Otabek, he thinks. A video like that demands a response, surely?

Yuri re-enters the room, bare bulb bleeding the colours from the mess around them, lone figure tied and gagged to a rusting chair and pipe in the corner.

There’s his balisong in his hand, glistening a red so dark it breathes a life of its own.

He cracks his neck, flexes his fingers.

Smiles.

Makes eye contact, and the man flinches, shivers so hard his jowls shake with it.

“You ever have nightmares?”

He finds every fear, feasts on the tender, soft parts of every good memory you think you have. Stares you straight in the eyes and laughs while he burns your home down.

Leans in close and whispers, dances a knife that slices red with every pass.

Eyes like the devil’s, this half-feral boy. He takes his own.

“You will.”

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Yuri sends the video off when he's done, the room behind him a Pollock masterpiece.

Cleanup’s not his thing. And for this job, cleanup would be besides the _point._

Otabek leaves him on _read_ , and Yuri sneers at the timestamp.

Shoots a message to Lilia one-handed, the other wiping the flat of his balisong on his jeans.

 _Fucker didn't last long_ , he types. _You said this would be fun_.

Lilia doesn't respond, but she never does, anyway. Not personally. Never directly.

There’ll be some message on the radio, later, on some number station at some godawful time in the fucking morning, embedded in nursery rhymes and mishmashed broadcasts spliced together, gibberish to anyone else listening in.

He’s got nothing to do for the next while, no op to plan, no uncleared assignments.

Nothing but rust flakes in the beds of his nails and the smell of iron at the back of his throat, eyes no one will meet and a soul no one can see.

Yuri heads for the hotel he’s been put up at, shucks his shirt and jeans and fucks with the smoke detector, burns the lot in the bath and flushes the remains.

Exits the bathroom naked, knocks back the entirety of the minibar’s pathetic offerings in a single go. Tiny Cabernet, check. Tiny Jim Beam, check. Tiny Spritzer? Shit, he’ll take that too.

Seven in the morning in Paris, city of _fucking_ love. Horrors around every corner.

Seven oh-seven, and Otabek sends a reply. Yuri’s chases the burn of alcohol with the acrid bitterness of a cigarette, ducks in and out of the shower to scrub blood from his skin.

_I’m at Gare du Nord._

Yuri should leave the fucker on _read_ , see how he likes it.

The sun is muted beyond the windows, an uncertain grey-blue. His hair drips a trail of water on the hotel carpet. It’s getting long again, down past his shoulders.

Yuri meets the gaze of his own reflection in the mirror. Twenty-three, young and beautiful. He thinks about -

Exchanges, probably, about how there’s nothing in him but hate and poison, and there’s a law on energy conservation, isn’t there, why the _fuck_ doesn’t that shit apply to him -

There’s only so much blood in your body, only so much strength in your hands. The human body is composed of finite resources. What does it say about him that his demons never _stop?_

And they’re not even _his_ , not really, he sleeps just fine and wakes up rested, he doesn’t give a shit about the number of kills to his name, thank _you;_ what does it say about him that he lives with his demons and they leave him in _peace?_

Raises a hand to curl around his own throat, moves a thumb to dig into a bruise right over his carotid, carrying the faintest shape of a mouth. Impressions from dark eyes watching him as Yuri rode him fast, bit his lip so hard he tasted the sting of copper on his tongue.

Inhales, sharp, with the dull press of pain.

“Fuck, Plisetsky,” he tells his reflection. “You’re a sad piece of shit.”

 

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Yuri blows Otabek in a bathroom stall off G _are du Nord,_ looks like an angel on his knees and sucks cock like the devil himself taught him to.

Otabek bites his back of his hand and grips the handle of the door so hard his knuckles white out with force, and Yuri scrapes teeth down the tip to make him _jerk_ , pulls back to grin with a smile too wide -

Tugs back foreskin to lave at the head, swallows the whole length down in a single go and lets Otabek thrust into his mouth, gaze dark and watching.

Always on him, fingers tracing the shape of Yuri’s lips around his cock, eyes soft.

Something in Yuri snarls at being gentled, bristles at kindness and mistakes warmth for weakness, and he grips Otabek by the balls and slides his mouth over and over his length, lets it hit the back of his throat and takes him down until Otabek comes, spilling bitter and salty on his tongue.

Yuri swallows, wipes his lips with the back of a rough hand and _smirks_ , walks out of the stall to the deserted bathroom to rinse his mouth out and smooth his hair down.

The sound of fabric rustling, the metal of a handle hitting tile, and Otabek’s behind him, tucked back into his slacks, leaning against the door to the stall.

Arms crossed, eyes indecipherable.

Otabek looks at him, holds his gaze for a second that drags too long, too sharp, too loud. Doesn’t look away.

“You’re leaving?” he asks.

Yuri scowls. He adjusts himself in his boxers, mood blackened by the wet stickiness he finds there. He retrieves his discarded jacket to glance back and find Otabek tossing Yuri’s balisong, the knife a blur in the air, in an expert grip.

The movement cuts the air in audible _swishes_ , a perfect slice on every throw. Hypnotic. Otabek’s eyes never leave his.

“You could stay, you know,” Otabek says, shrugging. “I came all this way.”

There’s a scathing retort on the tip of his tongue, poison straight from his marrow. Nothing he had to work for, nothing he had to exchange to receive. Nothing in him but monsters and sour hate, brought to you direct from dead parents and an uncle that took his own eyes so he wouldn’t have to see Yuri’s.

Yuri yanks his clothes into place, grabs Otabek by the nape and pulls him in to kiss, wet and filthy, bites his lip hard enough to draw blood and savours the answering hiss of pain.

“I _could_ ,” he says. “But I’m going to go anyway.”

He means: I am a child of horror and pain.

He means: I’m always going to do what was done to me.

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Yuri hits a bar, drinks shots he cons from men and women, winking pretty and biting his lip and looking up at them through lowered lashes, drinks until he’s hovering on the edge of _too drunk_ , until he can almost forget the way Otabek’d traced a finger along his jaw, cock in his mouth, looking at him like he was -

Like he was _precious,_ like he was made of glass, like there was more to him than a weapon.

Some muscled, macho caricature sidles up to him, eyes him up and down like he’s a pretty twink who’s going to roll over and beg.

"I'm John," he says, and it's such a plain fucking name to go with that generic muscle mass and buzz cut that Yuri could _laugh_ , and he does, tips his head back and sneers it, a curl of his lip and a flash of teeth.

John's duller than a sack of shit. Must be, because he takes the laughter as an invitation, sidles in to rest a forearm up against the bar by Yuri, some attempt to cage him in.

"Something funny?" he asks, cocky and cheered by the thumbs-ups and jeers from his buddies across the bar, as if Yuri couldn't see them right there, fucking idiots.

"Sure," Yuri says, lets the disdain drip across his voice, lets his face _show_ it, "The fact you think you have a chance."

John bristles, and Yuri cants away to tap his glass against the scarred surface of the bar, the universal call for another round.

"Hey, you shit -" There's a hand on his shoulder, meaty and probably meant to be threatening, what a _joke_.

And Yuri's hand is on the hilt of his balisong, kept concealed up his sleeve, muscles wound to move, his eyes coming up, first and last line of attack and defence, _hel-lo_ hell, won't you come out just to play?

"I believe the man said to fuck off."

Yuri’s watching the mirror behind the bar, meets Otabek’s eyes in it and _glares_ to no effect.

“I don’t think he did,” John retorts, bristling, and shit, he is one stupid motherfucker, isn't he? He steps up to Otabek, lets his arms fall akimbo, some piss-poor attempt at male posturing that Otabek rolls his eyes at, bored. “You want to go a round, mate?”

John’s moving, punches thrown, and Otabek’s whipsnap _fast_ , slamming him back down on the bar, face first, annoyance clear in his expression. John’s sputtering, clearly stunned, and Otabek -

“Oh,” he says, eyebrows raised. “I suppose you have a gift. Strength?” He leans in, curls a hand around John’s thumb -

 _Snaps_ it, the digit hanging limply with a cry of pain -

“Pity. Gifts are only useful if they _work_ , aren’t they?” He smiles. Wide, _mean._ “Guess what mine is?”

Yuri’s hard, _fuck_ , his cock is pressing against the zipper of his jeans, and every movement is _perfect_ agony.

John and his friends _run._

It’s the sort of bar where no one blinks an eye at violence and sex and sin, we police our own, thank you very much. Otabek shrugs at the room at large, and patrons turn back to their drinks, interest waning with the commotion over.

The barkeep eyes Otabek, the newcomer, then glances at Yuri and shrugs, figures they know each other and leaves them to it.

Yuri downs his last shot, stands from the bar and bows out, wipes the back of his mouth with his hand and tries to forget the last time he’d done that his lips were swollen and red, streak of come on his chin.

There’s Otabek, right _there,_ hip against the bar, smug smirk on his face in the low light.

Yuri Plisetsky, you’re better than this.

No -

No, he’s really not.

Otabek draws close, crowds him back against the bar until Yuri’s back hits the faded wood, slides a hand around to cradle his hip, smooths two fingers under his shirt to stroke the skin at the small of his back.

“I had it handled,” Yuri scowls, _hates_ the way his cock is up at attention, eager for action.

Otabek smile is wolfish, amused. “I know you did. Can’t say my way wasn’t _fun_ , though.” His other hand drifts low, hidden from the rest of the room by his body. Cups the front of Yuri’s jeans, thumbs at the traitorous swell. “And you’re all about the _fun_ , aren’t you?”

Something in Yuri clenches at that, tightens his chest. Yuri Plisetsky, good for a fuck, one-stop pleasure shop, he’s easy like that, isn’t he? Shit, you want _references?_

He shoves at Otabek, hard enough he has to take a step back, hand falling away from its cradle around him. “Blowjob earlier not enough, is that it? Swanning in to save the day, and now you want my ass as some kind of fucking reward?”

Otabek frowns, and there’s almost - _confusion_ , sharpening into consideration, then it’s gone.

He shrugs. “Well, if you don’t want it…”

Yuri snarls. Grabs Otabek by the lapels to slam their mouths together, teeth clacking with the force of it. Lips, tongue, the scrape of incisors, wet and hot and hungry.

He pulls back, watches the sheen of saliva on Otabek’s lower lip, recalls the way he’d made out with the Eurotrash _slut_ in a club and sent him a fucking _video_.

 _You can fuck anyone else,_ he thinks. _You may tire of me, walk away and leave, but you will never forget me. I will claw myself into you so the scars will never fade, I will press my taste onto your tongue until I become a craving, I will carve a hollow in the contours of my shape that no one else can fill._

_I will have this of you, forever, and in some way I will always own you._

“You got a room?”

Otabek tugs them back together, slots their hips so their cocks line up, pressed to their bodies in their clothing. He reaches into his coat, withdraws a hotel keycard.

Yuri snags it from his hand, reads off it. The _Four Seasons_ , shit. Otabek must _really_ want his ass something fierce.

Otabek watches him, studying. Yuri tosses the card back, rolls his shoulders and stalks to the exit.

“What,” he says over a shoulder, “You waiting for an engraved invitation?”

Otabek tosses down a couple hundred euros, enough for the barkeep to forget anything ever happened. Strolls out behind Yuri, tipping an imaginary hat as he goes.

Yuri Plisetsky, ain’t nobody going to love you like the devil do.

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Morning, six A.M.

Paris lit gold outside the windows, eight-hundred threadcount Egyptian cotton sheets tangled around his legs. Come smeared between his ass cheeks, _in_ him, dry and flaking on his stomach. Aching in his quads, the pull of bruises on his hips, ringed around his wrists, lining the flesh of his thighs.

Yuri stretches, feels the creak and pop of every joint that protests. Lounges on the bed, drowsy, head turned lazily to face the window. His hair is mussed on the pillow, eyes sleep-crusted.

Otabek stirs behind him, traces a line down the centre of his back, stops at the divot at the base of his spine. Trails back up to twine in his hair, playing with the strands. There are scratches along his forearms, scoring down his shoulders, over the edges of his tattoo, virulent suck marks high on his neck.

Yuri lifts a hand to run down the plane of Otabek’s back, the morning smudged with sleep. The gold stains everything, keeps reality pressed into a half-dream. He follows the line of Otabek’s tattoo, the eagle draped over his back, wings across shoulder blades. Pads of fingers absently dance across each feather, lazy curiosity making him bold.

It’s warm, decadent. Otabek hums under his breath, turns to shift them to curl up behind Yuri, fit their hips together, until their bodies are a parenthesis. Yuri drowses, sighs into his touch. Lets himself drift with the slow climb of morning, the hushed murmur of a city rising with dawn.

Otabek’s hand wanders, slides between Yuri’s legs, which part easily. Skirts past his cock to rub at the mess of come he’d left behind, brings his fingers up to slip into Yuri’s mouth, over his tongue.

Yuri huffs around the intrusion, sleepily amused. “You sick bastard.”

There’s no heat behind it. Yuri laves at his fingers, sucks away all remnants to return his fingers shiny with spit, faint bitterness left behind.

Otabek smooths a hand down his side, curves it around Yuri to tug him close.

“Hmm,” he hums, “We both know you love it.”

He leans in to nose at the base of Yuri’s neck, feathers a kiss to vulnerable skin. Soft, careful, almost reverent.

Gentle.

Yuri bolts upright, startles Otabek into relinquishing his hold around his waist, swings his legs off the bed to paw around for his clothes.

There’s -

In his _chest,_ it’s -

If you tame a wild creature, you do nothing more than break it.

Ruin it.

Tell it it’s worth something, tell it you love it. Tell it you’ll stay, tell it you _want_ it to stay.

Whittle it down to something docile, something meek.

Kill it.

With kindness, with softness in your eyes. Take away every edge it has until the only edge it knows is the scrape of your teeth down its throat, the press of your lips to tender skin.

Tell it it means the world, then move on and leave it defenceless to die. More fool it for believing you.

Good men get good things in life. All things come at a price. The devil don’t make deals at crossroads no more.

Yuri bites the inside of his cheek, keeps his back to Otabek as he steps into discarded boxers, pulls on a shirt, buttons missing.

Otabek sighs. Sits up, runs a hair through his mussed hair, sheets pooling around his waist.

“Do we really have to do this every time?”

Yuri freezes, a split-second pause that Otabek can’t have missed, not with his eyes. His fucking ever-watchful _eyes_ , shit, you’d think he’s the one with Yuri’s gift here. He curls in, hates his body for the automatic defence, unwinds himself for the strike.

“Don’t like being ridden hard and put away wet?” Yuri mocks, pitches his tone cruel.

Don’t show your belly, boy. You think the world is _kind?_

The Four Seasons and champagne in bed and some posturing shit at a bar.

You think someone’s going to love you for who you are?

Yuri’s always just been about the _fun_ , hasn’t he, demon child. Spit in eyes and steal some fiddles, four horsemen but he’s always been the ace up the sleeve.

No one’s going to love you.

Love makes you _weak._

Otabek shifts, the sheets falling away from his lap as he turns to face Yuri, half-crossed legged on the bed. He curls a dangerous smile, moves so the eye is drawn to the lines of his body. The planes of his chest, the curve of his cock. Perfect masculine form.

“Ah, _Yura,_ ” he drawls, “You say that as if you aren’t always begging to get fucked.”

Push and pull. For everything you take for yourself, life takes away.

Yuri snaps his teeth together, a _tch_ and he’s snatching his phone fallen under the sofa, swinging his coat on and heading out the door.

There’s a tourist family in the lift when it arrives on his floor. A flash of eye contact, brief and fleeting, and he unwittingly makes the baby in the pram cry, screaming wails that follow him out the lobby.

_Bad._

_Fucking._

_Eyes._

He gets back to the flat he’s lying low at, heads to the bathroom to piss and wipe at the slick between his legs. Meets his own gaze in the mirror. Snarls and puts a fist through it.

Yuri leans over the sink, cut hands braced on the porcelain, smearing blood on white.

Eyes closed.

Don’t think.

Just breathe.

 

 

 

_____

 

 

 

March first.

It’s his birthday, the first of the spring thaw cracking through the parks, the grey of winter ceding its stage in gradual smudges of colour.

Twenty-four, what a number. Multiply that by three-sixty-five, like it means something.

Just another fucking year of the same old shit. Over and over.

There’s an extra grand in his account, courtesy of Lilia, and Yakov sends a brief text, along with details of his next job.

Some debts you pay for the rest of your life.

Victor calls a little past noon.

Yuri nearly lets it ring to silence. Scowls and hates himself for not being able to, the anger churning in his gut as he swipes to answer.

“Ah, the birthday boy himself.” Victor sounds the same as ever, smug and self-assured like the asshole he is, like he isn’t a traitorous bastard, a lying, disloyal _waste_ of space.

“What do you want?” He’s gritting his teeth, clenching so hard his jaw aches.

“I can’t call to wish you happy birthday?” Victor sounds faintly put-out, tinged with amusement.

It’s all so condescending and patronising, Yuri can picture his smirk perfectly, like everyone’s on the receiving end of some grand, cosmic joke, and Victor’s the only one in on it. Son of a _bitch._

“Why, finally found the time to pull your cock out of that pig you’re fucking?”

There’s a beat of silence. Brutal, wounding victory. Then Victor speaks, and his voice is dripping false honey, diamond-sharp underneath.

“Why, Yuri,” he says, “I didn’t know you were so interested in my sex life.”

Yuri grins vicious, scents the blood in the water. “And what does Lilia think about this?”

“Lilia’s aware of my assignment.”

“Yeah? She’s _aware_ you’re living with him? Going to your - little parties? She’s _aware_ you’ve got a fucking _dog_ together?”

“What’s your point?” Victor’s dropped all pretense of amiability, voice hard.

Yuri curses. “ _Okhuyet_ , you really don’t _see_ it, do you? Some of us know the meaning of _loyalty._ And I’m not alone in beginning to think you need a reminder.”

Silence.

Yuri balls a hand into a fist, wishes he could drive it into Victor’s face. “A year and a half, Victor. Time’s nearly up, and you won’t like me if I’m sent after you.”

“If you _touch him - ”_

Yuri’s nearly stepping back with the fury in Victor’s voice, the force and strength of it setting alarms blaring in his mind.

Then he’s recalculating, reworking everything in the framework he knows, and it’s -

Yuri used to look up to him, wanted to _be_ him, would trail around after him asking to be taught things, shown things -

Pathetic, really, that _the_ Victor Nikiforov has been reduced to _this._

“Oh,” Yuri drawls, and there’s visceral, unkind _delight_ , he’s every knife twist in bleeding hearts, he senses weakness and crows cruel triumph - “You’re _in love_ with him. You think you’re in love with him, this pig with a gift that makes you believe things. This is _rich_.”

“Yuri?” Victor’s voice is silky, deceptively soft. The hard edge of danger clear in its glacier coldness. “I’m only going to say this once. If you _touch him,_ if anything happens to him, I’ll know who to come for. And if I have to? I’m going to remind you why I’ve been the best in this field since _long_ before you killed you first man. I’ve been in this game far longer than you have. Don’t test me, _Yura._ You won’t like what you find.”

Yuri laughs. Low, full-bellied, ripe with ugliness and mirth and disbelief. Victor furious turns into ice, glacial in his anger, makes silence an art. Lethal words, a knife between your ribs.

But Yuri, Yuri’s never been about _that,_ never been about subtlety and grace because blood is blood and spilled guts on the ground look the same no matter who they belong to; he licks his teeth and smiles too sharp, smells your wound and stalks in smaller circles, taunts, _if you dare, come a little closer._

“You know, Victor,” he says, “When your house of cards comes burning down, I’m going be here, smiling and handing out the gasoline.”

Yuri drops the call, thumbs the phone screen with excessive force. Holds it tight in a fist, then lobs it across the hotel room with a wordless yell. It hits the bed and bounces, clatters to the floor out of sight.

Victor. Victor _fucking_ Nikiforov, he-who-does-no-wrong, Yakov and Lillia’s golden boy.

_Oh, Victor knows what he’s doing._

_Let Victor handle it his way._

_Victor has the experience, Victor knows better._

Shit. _Shit._ As if either of them have any _idea_ how in over his head Victor is, playing house with his Japanese _toy_ and aping at sickening domesticity.

If you _touch him._

Love is -

Fucking disgusting, insidious as poison and _worse_ because it doesn’t even have the goddamned decency to be upfront to your face about killing you, takes a strong man and _breaks_ him and renders him defenceless and _weak_ and fucking _grateful for the fact_.

Yuri swears under his breath, vulgar and harsh. Feels the demons tremble in his bones, shivering for release.

 _Look, look at yourself_ , they say. _You're a useless, snivelling, helpless fool. You're four and at your uncle's mercy, you're five and indentured to Yakov's. Your mother used to sing. Happy things, high melodies, until you looked at her._

 _Look_ , _boy_.

Some debts you pay for the rest of your life.

Push until you find the point where the ocean meets the sky, where the yawning maw of nature collapses and swallows you whole. Blood in the water now, son, and you're not the biggest shadow out there.

Don't ever forget the dead. They'll never forget you.

We all know the dead don’t love no one.

 _(We all know the dead don’t love_ you _.)_

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Warm beds in Parisian hotels, sunlight the colour of gold. Skin against skin under sleep-mussed sheets, kisses feathered to pliant bodies between the breakable eternity of circled arms.

Yuri would claw the memory from his brain if he could. He grits his teeth against it, grinds his molars together.

Thinks -

How do you kill a monster?

Resurrect the man.

Make him foolish enough for _hope,_ plant lies that he’s worth more than the demons in his head, show him someone who looks him in the eye and sees nothing but colour.

_Look, boy._

Yuri has no use for the man. Nothing humane has ever served him well, civility is a lie people tell themselves so they sleep better at night. God, he knows this, he knows _better_ than this, surely.

He’s in Taldykorgan.

 _Fuck_.

Yuri’s got no job lined up here, no excuse to be in this back-ass shithole of Almaty other than -

_I just killed a woman in Turkmenistan, I was in your part of the world._

It’s all fun and games. Yuri’s all about the _fun_ , don’t forget that.

He exhales cigarette smoke in a furious rush, annoyed with himself. White-grey tendrils curl around him, then dissipate and die, leaving behind their bitter-smelling, unsighted remains.

 _Almaty sucks,_ he jabs into a text, sends it off before he can change his mind.

The reply is almost instantaneous, the speed of it lifting a corner of his lips, pleased.

_You’re in Kazakhstan?_

He sticks the cigarette in his mouth, inhales through his next text.

_How else would I know this place is shit?_

A brief pause, and Yuri plucks the cigarette from the cradle of his lips, flicks devil-eyed ash to the ground.

_Where are you?_

He rolls his eyes. _Taldykorgan, where else? Hessen Pub, off the city square._

The cigarette is burnt down now, nearly a bud that threatens to singe his fingers. He drops it to the ground, grinds it under a heel. A passing woman sends him a disapproving look, and Yuri bares his teeth, makes eye contact. Her face pales, and she trips in her haste to cross the street away from him.

There’s no reply from Otabek, not yet, and Yuri huffs in impatience. _Shit, get over yourself,_ he sends, _Are you coming to get me or not?_

Ten minutes without a response, and Yuri’s good mood is rapidly dwindling.

A bike roars some distance off, a Harley from the bass rumble.

Yuri rolls his neck to work out the kinks, shrugs his Prada duffel over a shoulder.

Smiles.

“You’re lucky I was in the area,” Otabek says, and his expression is stony, face impassive, and Yuri _smirks,_ pulls him in with enough force that their teeth clack together, kisses him and draws away pupils-blown and lips shiny with spit, tracing the edge of his teeth with his tongue.

He swings a leg over the bike, slides down the smooth leather to press his hips into Otabek’s, curves in to hook his chin over a jacketed shoulder.

“Hmm,” he hums, biting an earlobe. Otabek jerks minutely between his legs. “I _do_ always get lucky, don’t I?”

Yuri pats Otabek’s thigh, gestures at the bike. “Well, _Beka?_ Going to give me a ride?”

And Otabek -

Otabek’s always aloof, always stoic and quiet, he fucks Yuri and asks no questions, holds him down and makes him _take it_ and stymies his viciousness with bedrock.

Almost _shy_ in his silence, until he breaks a wrist and smiles slow, makes you remember why he does what he does. Kill or be killed, no story ever went any other way. Yuri knows how to pick them best.

But this time, _this time_ he shoots Yuri a - _look,_ indecipherable and vast, and says -

“And if I say no?”

Yuri -

Falters, nearly, blinks twice and feels his fingers tighten around the handle of his bag, can barely keep the words from tripping of his tongue and it sours in his throat.

_Why else would you have come for me?_

He hisses under his breath, begins to twist to disembark.

Otabek stops him with a hand on his wrist, and Yuri bristles.

Thinks -

_How dare you._

Snatches his wrist from Otabek’s grip.

Thinks -

_My monsters are mine, my scum of the earth and black blood in my veins, there is no place for soft things here._

It is a cruel thing to learn that there is no place for softness in you. A cruel lesson, a necessary evil.

Otabek sighs, turning away from Yuri. Breaks the pinion of his gaze, wraps and unwraps hands around the handles of his bike. Curls the fingers, once, twice.

“Come on,” Otabek says, “I’ll take you out to dinner.”

He reaches behind him, nudges Yuri back to cradling him between his thighs. Hands him a helmet. Leopard-printed, familiar. The new-purchase smell now faded with time.

Yuri startles, hates his body for the lack of control. “You had this with you in New York.”

Otabek shrugs, inclines his head in a half-nod. “It’s yours.”

It’s not a question, not _it’s yours if you want it,_ not _it’s a spare, it’s yours._ A statement of fact.

_It’s yours._

Yuri takes it. Turns it around in his hands, runs fingers through his hair and tugs the helmet on. Clips the buckle and swallows hard, nudges Otabek with his knees.

Shuts his eyes and digs nails into his palms, hates the foreign words on his tongue, hates Otabek for making him offer it.

“Thank you.”

Soft things.

Dead things.

It is far crueller to learn that and be made to want it anyway.

 

 

_____

 

 

 

Bellies full, the evening drooping with heavy dark. The streets of Taldykorgan bathed in amber light, splashes of colour from storefronts and lit signs.

The wind whips past, brisk.

Yuri’s heady with the wine they had with dinner at the down-home, family-run place they’d gone to. Boisterous laughter, tables crammed with the rush-hour crowd, glasses clinking high.

The two of them at dinner, shoved in at the back at a tiny table that meant their legs tangled together, that meant sharing food was an afterthought of space.

They’re in a residential quarter, the streets muted and grey.

Otabek pulls up next to an apartment complex, sleek metal-and-glass new. Parks his Harley and shoulders Yuri’s duffel, stows their helmets away and locks up.

Yuri whistles low, looks up at the soaring building.

“You’ve been holding out on me, Altin.”

He’s loose with good food and the fatigue of travel.

For once, his demons are quiet. There’s nothing to this, dinner between friends and a quick romp after between sheets.

The Four Seasons and champagne, golden mornings with quiet warmth. Laughter and shared plates in Almaty, legs tangled together under tables.

No one ever said Yuri wasn’t a liar.

They ride the lift to the top floor, step out into the penthouse.

It’s dark, Otabek moving off to shuck off shoes and discard outdoor detritus. His coat, keys, bag. Sounds of it all being returned to their places.

Yuri stands at the entrance, door shut behind him. Devil eyes, demon eyes. He’s _looking,_ you know? That’s all he ever does, all he comes down to, Yuri Plisetsky and his wrong, _wrong_ glare. Measure humanity by what we do not have, what we _could_ have; Yuri is a man rich in lack, greedy in want.

Across the room, there’s Otabek’s well-worn leather jacket thrown over a dining chair. By the sofa, there’s his battered copy of _The Hitchhiker’s Guide_ on the coffee table. Over the bureau, framed photographs of laughing, smiling people, all with the same eyes, the same distinct jawline. A half-empty glass of water by the kitchen sink, a stack of books on a wooden desk.

He looks and _looks_ , drinks it all in, all his life he’s looked and touched what he’s wanted but he’s never ever _held._

He thinks this is something he might want to, and it rolls ugly, rolls terror in him.

No one reaches to get the lights, and the moon spills gentle past the windows. The flat cast in shadows, night fully upon them.

It smells like - _Otabek_ , like Yuri’s stepped into him so completely he can forget to be himself for a while, like this an overnight stop on the grand highway to hell and Yuri can afford to tread quietly on dreams past the nightmares of his own making.

Here, he can - cut himself down, maybe, keep his sharp edges by the door and breathe easier, breathe deeper. Rest in safety and remember ruin only as a state that exists outside the world of this room; go to a far better rest than he has known and skip doing anything better.

Otabek moves first, goes to drop Yuri’s duffel on the sofa and stretch, the lines of his body silhouetted in the lambent moonlight. His shirt rides up, exposes a sliver of skin, the cut-glass planes of muscle.

Enter, stage left, this is why Otabek brought him here, isn’t it?

Yuri steps out of his shoes, shrugs out of his coat and tosses it uncaring to the floor, saunters over to Otabek.

Presses up behind him, back to front. Works his hands round to find the buckle of Otabek’s belt, undulates his hips so he can feel Yuri hard against him.

Otabek’s body, relaxed with familiar territory, goes stiff. He shifts, breaks from Yuri’s hold and angles away.

Yuri gapes, then snaps with the rejection. “What the _fuck_ is that?”

Most people would flinch now, would see the danger and balk. Brilliant danger, tremulous and bowed, the animal parts of them skittering away.

Not Otabek, of- _goddamned_ -course not, not the unflappable Otabek Altin, inscrutable and always - fucking - bemused at Yuri or some _shit_ , with his half-smiles and silence and oceanic, unknowable depth.

But he’s never turned Yuri down, never said no to fucking him, not the first time he’d smiled at Yuri with bloodied lips and smashed their mouths together, fucked Yuri with minimal prep up against the wall of that moulding safehouse in Bogota, not the time after that in Brussels when he’d buried himself balls-deep in Yuri’s mouth until he choked on come, or the time after _that_ when they finally made it to a bed in Lawrence and he’d taken Yuri apart with his fingers, then fucked him to mutual exhaustion.

Yuri Plisetsky, all about the _fun_.

Otabek’s profile is thrown into harsh relief, painted in shadow. Yuri hates his quiet, hates the way he wields silence like a weapon Yuri’s never learned to defend against.

A brief exhalation, and Otabek runs a hand down his face, expression lost to the dark.

“It doesn’t always have to be about the sex.”

And Yuri -

Stops. Disconnects, understanding failing.

There are - emotions too big for words, sometimes, feelings larger than the entire scope of language can fathom. Than the _mind_ can comprehend, all of it just - roiling, churning, twisting up in themselves all at once until it hits as a morass of -

Fear, probably, hurt and uncertainty, ancillary thought falling away until you can find it in yourself to just _breathe_ through the abyss you foolishly glanced into and found staring back.

There is bitterness, anger, dead hope and regret, the long arm of the past reaching out to grab you by the throat. _Boy, something’s broken in you. Mother couldn’t stand the sight of you, Uncle tried to fuck you and left his eyeballs on the floor._

_Useless animals get put down, we slit their throats and call it mercy. You think this would hurt if you hadn’t gone soft? More fool you, boy, more fool you._

Yuri curls his hands into fists, rounds on Otabek. Shoves him so hard he falls a half-step back.

“Look at me,” he seethes. “ _Look,_ you fucker. You - fucking - _stare_ , all the time, you think I don’t see the way you look at me?” He slams a fist into the wall, pain scorching up his knuckles.

“And I come all the way to your shitty country, we had that - that _dinner,_ and _now_ you say you don’t want to fuck me? On my knees in Paris, in Brussels, bent over for you in Bogota, in Penang, in Moscow, shit, all over the fucking _world_ and you won’t fuck me in your _home?”_

He whirls, heads blindly for his duffel on the sofa. He has to - to _leave,_ to get the fuck out of this country, get out of _Europe_ , if that’s what it takes -

“Fuck you,” he hurls over a shoulder. “Fuck you, _Beka,_ you think you’re too good for me now?”

A hand on his arm, and instinct has him curving to _fight_ , to push back, to _hurt._ Otabek catches his chin and Yuri snarls, jerks and finds himself held fast. Backed into a wall, Otabek’s other hand cradling bruised knuckles, soothing.

And Yuri yanks his hand away, snaps his teeth at the way he’s being treated like a cornered animal, gentled into submission.

A pause, and Otabek moves in increments, eyes fixed on his. The hand on Yuri’s chin shifting to cup his cheek, the other rising to rest on his hip, fingers sliding under fabric. Stroking - lightly, slowly, wary of startling, the barest hint of pressure.

Otabek’s lips part. “The first time I saw you, it was after my op in Bali. Four years ago, four years and two months.”

Yuri - frowns, the turn in conversation startling. When he speaks, it is reluctant, pulled from him. “I don’t - ”

Otabek shrugs. “I don’t expect you to remember. I was reporting in to Yakov at HQ, you were going through files in his office. Focused, never looking up the whole time I was there.”

He shifts, clears his throat, slides the hand around Yuri’s cheek to rest carefully on his collar, grazing the bone. There are fingers by his jugular, over pulse points that beat hard, beat human, blood that Yuri won’t believe runs red.

“When you did, when you looked up, you - had the eyes of a soldier. Wounded, hunted, bristling with strength.” A pause, and a swallow. “You were - _are_ \- the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

Fingers move to stroke the underside of his jaw, and Yuri trembles with it. The crushing weight of letting yourself become vulnerable and fragile, the ache of hoping someone will see your weakness and let it slide. The audacity of thinking the world might be kind enough to let you _rest._

“I asked Lilia about you, after.”

Yuri jerks at that, follows with a sharp inhale, distantly amused through everything else storming through him. “Yeah? What did she say?”

Otabek chuckles, low, breathy things that rumble up from him, laughter so rare it steals all semblance of coherent thought from Yuri’s mind.

“ _He’s not for you, Otabek Altin_ ,” he says, affecting the organic imperiousness of Lilia’s tone, and Yuri can’t help but smile a little, even as a part of him _wonders_ , some childish rhyme - _not for you, not for who?_ \- then Otabek’s continuing -

“Too strong, too fierce, too good, not for the likes of some no-name Kazakh bratva upstart. I heard everything she didn’t say.”

The hand on his collar slips down to mirror the one on his waist, cradles the curve of his hips, calloused palms on smooth skin. Warm, rough, rasping with the right degree of friction.

Otabek _tugs_ , force pulling Yuri up against him, their hips fitted together, bodies pressed in a sinuous line.

“Bogota,” Otabek says, smiling slow and ripe with the words, heavy with meaning and promise. “You remember that?”

Yuri nods. Breaks his gaze, glances unseeing over Otabek’s shoulder and Otabek drops his head, noses until he brings it back, eyes on him.

Always on him.

Otabek smiles with the sharp edge of teeth, a scimitar smile. Wicked curving, dangerous and _this_ side of mean, calls to the wild things in Yuri.

“Yuri Plisetsky, Yakov and Lilia’s _darling_ boy, with that balisong in your hand and blood on your fists. I remembered everything Lilia said and I _took,_ fucked you anyway, until I couldn’t get you out of my head.”

This.

This is call and answer, the unknowing pull that spirals out to the universe, straining, bucking to be heard -

Like there is a word inside you that is who you are, and you can search your whole life to hope to find someone that knows what it is.

Yuri can’t breathe, not past the uncertainty and trepidation and - other things, lighter things, brighter things, bubbling in his chest. He curls fingers into the hem of Otabek’s shirt, balls fists that hurt with effort, the wrenching of unknown emotions. A struggling yearning, trapped want.

 

“I’m looking at you, _Yura,_ I always am.”

There’s the shadow of a smile, a thumb tracing the line of Yuri’s jaw, down to the ledge of his lower lip.

“Your eyes,” Otabek says. “They’re a beautiful green, you know?”

And -

 _Oh,_ Yuri thinks.

_Oh._

 

_____

 

 

 

“You’re not supposed to feed him that.”

Yuri scoffs, sneaks Makkachin another buttered carrot slice before looking up, squinting his eyes against the dawn sun. Victor has his hands in the pockets of his linen slacks, feet barefoot in the sand.

“Says who? Katsuki?”

He deliberately tosses Makkachin another slice, and is rewarded with boisterous licks on his hand for his efforts. He hides the grimace at the excess of drool, knows the Puma will be huffy with him for the dog-scent on his clothes.

Victor laughs, a carefree thing that carries into the surf.

“He’s scarier than you, _Yura._ I’m blaming you if he finds out.”

Yuri stands, dusting off sand. “Fuck’s sake, _Vitya,_ you’re whipped to hell.”

There’s a high whistle from behind them, and Makkachin lopes off, lolls his cheerful way over to Yuuri, waving from the porch. Otabek’s by his side, bearing a pitcher of tea and a stack of glasses.

They pick their way after Makkachin, heading up the stairs to the deck.

Sunrise over Mauritius bleeds pink into the water, breeze that ripples the waters in strokes. Orange in the sky, giving way to yellows. Turner’s Temeraire stretching through the years, yet each one of them the sole curator of this moment.

Three years.

Three years of this quiet, fragile thing, fluttering in his rib cage like the smallest hummingbird. Three years is one thousand and ninety-five days, thirty-six months of this, whatever _this_ is, skirting terrifyingly close to love. 

Most days, Yuri’s still waiting for the Devil to come collect. The soft things are the dead things, and he’s killed plenty of them himself and left them rotting. This thing is -

Shit, it’ll last however long it lasts, he’ll cast stones and spit fire and take what he can get, sunsets and sunrises all.

“Thank you for coming,” Katsuki says, smiling soft at him, and there’s -

A strength to him, maybe, beneath the faraway looks in his eyes. A rooted steadfastness and some brand of wisdom. Bullet scars that peek out from under his shirts, round marks that Yuri catches Victor pressing fingers to when he thinks no one’s looking.

“Yeah, whatever,” Yuri replies, but there’s no heat to his words. “Victor’s fucking old now, if I miss his birthday who’s going to remind him of that?”

Otabek and Victor are talking across the deck, bodies relaxed and loose. Otabek says something and Victor laughs, and Otabek’s got that small smile of his, curving the corners of his lips. He catches Yuri looking and wanders over, slips their hands together.

Easy as breathing.

Otabek squeezes his hand in his, and Yuri thinks about the dinners they have together, their flat in Moscow, three litter boxes in properties in their names scattered across the world because of Puma -

There’s a little tattoo behind Victor’s right ear, barely larger than a thumbnail. A Japanese character, kanji.

勇。

Courage, bravery.

And it’s - stupid, of course, so _goddamned_ stupid to mark yourself with something so obvious like that, in their line of work with what they do and who they _kill_ , but -

Yuri gets it, a little. There are twin gold bands on Victor and Katsuki’s fingers, absent-minded brushes between longtime lovers and fond smiles over shared jokes.

Otabek traces the fragile underside of Yuri’s wrist with his thumb. The sun climbs to its throne above Mauritius, lashes gold across its vast canvas. Push until you find the point where the ocean meets the sky; Yuri’s found it, he thinks, here in the palm of his hand.

He turns to Otabek, holds their joined hands between them. Finds him watching.

Three years and he’s never stopped.

“ _Beka,”_ he asks, “What colour are my eyes?”

“Green,” Otabek answers, and it’s this ritual they have, not four-letter words but something strikingly close.

And it’s worth it, he thinks, this softness, this sickness, taking it into you. Like a - drug, a vaccination, maybe, immunity through exposure. Tear down to build up. Destroy; let something stronger take its place.

There’s an ache deep inside him, that blooms low when he shifts and moves. Bruises on the inside of his thighs that would fit the shape of Otabek’s fingers exactly, mauve-red bites on the tender skin above his hip bones.

Wild things, tamed things.

Otabek touches their foreheads together, noses Yuri’s temple with his own. Presses a kiss there.

Katsuki laughs from somewhere to their right, carried by the wind, and there’s Victor’s voice, the words unintelligible with distance, delighted. Makkachin barks, races around with skittering paws.

Yuri breathes the ocean air, the salt breeze and crisp morning. Allows himself the moment, rest to ruin. Turns his face into the crook of Otabek’s neck, inhales him and kisses his throat, one predator to another, wayward sons carrying on.

You think someone’s going to love _you_?

Maybe.

 _He’s not for you_ but you seize and _take_ it for yourself, fight to make it your own.

Carve a place for yourself, claw scars that will never fade.

The morning is high, day breaks and is broken. Kill or be killed, no story ever went any other way but they'll _make_ it.

It will be this, forever, for as long as the world allows, until the Devil takes his own, all of them and Yuri alone.

 _Shit_ , here we go.

 

 

_FIN._

**Author's Note:**

> Whew, that was a ride. This was...difficult to write, but I'm glad I tried my hand at an introspective character piece all the same? Trying to figure out the right blend of coarseness and prose was a struggle, particularly since Yuri's such a difficult, obstinate character to wrap my head around. I didn't get to worldbuild as much as I'd have liked, either, but - well. It was a blast, all in all. Thanks for coming along for the ride!
> 
> If you're interested, more information on Number Stations (though only mentioned briefly in passing) - which is genuinely what espionage agents up to the present day use to communicate with their agencies/handlers via AM radios - can be found [here](http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24910397).
> 
> Anyhow, on to the references - I've had eclectic tastes as of late, so forgive the weird material here:
> 
> From Neruda's _[October Fullness](http://www.lorenwebster.net/In_a_Dark_Time/2008/12/03/nerudas-october-fullness/)_ , the lines referenced are: "In the end, everyone is aware of this: / nobody keeps any of what he has, / and life is only a borrowing of bones."
> 
> From the song _[Stay](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF8BRvqGCNs)_ by Rihanna ft. Mikky Ekko, because I am mainstream trash: "If you dare, come a little closer."
> 
> From Jean-Paul Sartre's _Les Jeux Sont Faits_ : "Man is not the sum of what he has already, but rather the sum of what he does not yet have, of what he could have."
> 
> From W.B. Yeats's _[Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven](https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/aedh-wishes-cloths-heaven)_ , the specific lines are: "I have spread my dreams under your feet; / Tread softly because you tread on my dreams."
> 
> From Confucius's _Analects_ : "The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come. When in a state of security he does not forget the possibility of ruin. When all is orderly, he does not forget that disorder may come. Thus his person is not endangered, and his States and all their clans are preserved."
> 
> From Charles Dickens's _A Tale of Two Cities_ : "It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.”
> 
> 勇 is the kanji character meaning bravery, or courage, and is one of the two characters that make up Yuuri (勇利).
> 
>  _[The Fighting Temeraire](http://img.auctiva.com/imgdata/3/7/4/5/0/2/webimg/277053661_o.jpg)_ is a painting by J.M.W. Turner, and it is exhibited at the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, London.
> 
> _____
> 
>  
> 
> As a final request, I'm going to ask that **constructive criticism please be withheld**. For those of you thinking 'wow astoryaboutwar just wants us to say nice things', that's not what concrit is - it's still entirely your prerogative if you want to comment just to tell me you hate something. Concrit is a pretty specific form of critique (which is NOT the same as criticism), and I've had horrible, awful experiences with it in the past, and I'd rather just not deal with it again in my unpaid writing. Because I've gotten so much unnecessary grief over this, a more detailed explanation of the distinction between constructive criticism (critique) vs. plain criticism and the reasoning behind my request can be found [here](http://astoryaboutwar.tumblr.com/post/154896389040/psa-constructive-criticism-is-a-specific).
> 
> Don't get me wrong, though - comments are ALWAYS welcome and much loved. I live for comments!
> 
> I can be found on Tumblr [here](http://astoryaboutwar.tumblr.com/). Come say hi - I post drabbles and snippets of fics I'm working on from time to time!
> 
>  
> 
> \-----
> 
>  
> 
> Ginny here! Thanks for checking our collaboration out. Hope you enjoyed what we worked on! I'm also on Tumblr as [ravynashling](https://ravynashling.tumblr.com) if you wanna say hi, and as [ravynartling](https://ravynartling.tumblr.com) if you wanna see more of my art. :)


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